Patio Lanterns - Kim Mitchell

This night will fall like any other Daylight subsides and shadows crawl Out from under black corners Hiding something stars All so restless Cracked windows open wide Dead-bolt turns, doors creak open Whispers and moonlight there to guide Come raise your lantern to the sky Can we illuminate this night? We'll dance like heathens round a flame While the world sleeps we are awake The black brook calls, it sings a chorus While the gathering swells The flames grow tall right before us As drums keep pounding And the masses now are fusing Bodies pressed and tangled As we revel in confusion Our inhibitions thrown into the fire Come raise your lantern to the sky Can we illuminate this night? We'll dance like heathens round a flame While the world sleeps we are awake Here in the dark we are safe from the judgment Now arm in arm locked tight so no one gets in The hell is sent, see, child, you are hellbent But hell is not where we're going, hell is where we've been Come raise your lantern to the sky And let's illuminate this night We'll dance like heathens around the flame And while the world sleeps we are awake Raise your lantern to the sky And let's illuminate this night We'll dance like heathens around the flames While the world sleeps we are awake (Raise your lantern to the sky) Yeah, we are awake (Hey, hey, hey) We are awake (Now raise your lantern to the sky) We are awake, yeah, we are awake, we are awake

I'm traveling in some vehicle I'm sitting in some cafe A defector from the petty wars That shell shock love away There's comfort in melancholy When there's no need to explain It's just as natural as the weather In this moody sky today In our possessive coupling So much could not be expressed So now i'm returning to myself These things that you and i suppressed I see something of myself in everyone Just at this moment of the world As snow gathers like bolts of lace Waltzing on a ballroom girl You know it never has been easy Whether you do or you do not resign Whether you travel the breadth of extremities Or stick to some straighter line Now here's a man and a woman sitting on a rock They're either going to thaw out or freeze Listen... Strains of benny goodman Coming thru' the snow and the pinewood trees I'm porous with travel fever But you know i'm so glad to be on my own Still somehow the slightest touch of a stranger Can set up trembling in my bones I know - no one's going to show me everything We all come and go unknown Each so deep and superficial Between the forceps and the stone Well i looked at the granite markers Those tribute to finality - to eternity And then i looked at myself here Chicken scratching for my immortality In the church they light the candles And the wax rolls down like tears There's the hope and the hopelessness I've witnessed thirty years We're only particles of change i know, i know Orbiting around the sun But how can i have that point of view When i'm always bound and tied to someone White flags of winter chimneys Waving truce against the moon In the mirrors of a modern bank >from the window of a hotel room I'm traveling in some vehicle I'm sitting in some cafe A defector from the petty wars Until love sucks me back that way

Three waitresses all wearing Black diamond earrings Talking about zombies And Singapore slings No trouble in their faces Not one anxious voice None of the crazy you get From too much choice The thumb and the satchel Or the rented Rolls-Royce And you think she knows something By the second refill You think she's enlightened As she totals your bill You say "Show me the way To Barangrill" Well some say it's in service They say "Humble Makes Pure" You're hoping it's near Folly 'Cause you're headed that way for sure And you just have to laugh 'Cause it's all so crazy Ah, her mind's on her boyfriend And eggs over easy It's just a trick on you Her mirrors and your will So you ask the truck driver On the way to the till But he's just a slave To Barangrill The guy at the gaspumps He's got a lot of soul He sings Merry Christmas for you Just like Nat King Cole And he makes up his own tune Right on the spot About whitewalls and windshields And this job he's got And you want to get moving And you want to stay still But lost in the moment Some longing gets filled And you even forget to ask "Hey, Where's Barangrill?"

Marcie in a coat of flowers Stops inside a candy store Reds are sweet and greens are sour Still no letter at her door So she'll wash her flower curtains Hang them in the wind to dry Dust her tables with his shirt and wave another day goodbye Marcie's faucet needs a plumber Marcie's sorrow needs a man Red is autumn, green is summer Greens are turning and the sand All along the ocean beaches stares up empty at the sky Marcie buys a bag of peaches Stops a postman passing by And summer goes, falls to the sidewalk like string and brown paper Winter blows up from the river, there's no one to take her To the sea Marcie dresses warm, it's snowing Takes a yellow cab uptown Red is stop and green's for going Sees a show and rides back down Down along the Hudson River Past the shipyards in the cold Still no letter's been delivered Still the winter days unfold Like magazines fading in dusty grey attics and cellars Make a dream, dream back to summer and hear how he tells her "Wait for me" Marcie leaves and doesn't tell us Where or why she moved away "Red is angry, green is jealous", that was all she had to say Someone thought they saw her Sunday Window shopping in the rain Someone heard she bought a one-way ticket And went West again